the wall. I heard the sheathing of his sword. I had an impression of great size and bodily power. Before I could collect myself, he turned and was off, still in shadow.
I stood, two fallen men around me, another still alive, but choking out his last in my arms. From the blank, still expression on his face, I saw that the one I’d got in the bladder was dead. I must have got a blood vessel. My legs began to shake. I was in no position to follow the stranger.
‘Who are you?’ I cried feebly.
No response.
I thought to cry out a few words of thanks. But I could think of nothing appropriate. The stranger was gone. There was silence where he’d been. The shadows now were all of the same darkness.
I pushed the dying man forward. He fell with a crunch onto his face. Still cautious, I knelt down to examine him. I’d got him in the windpipe, sure enough, and he was going fast.
‘Who sent you?’ I asked, twisting at the now shattered nose. ‘Give me his name. Did you kill Maximin?’
The hole in his throat gave a shrill whistle. His lips moved in an obscenity. I reached down and tried to cover the hole, so he could get some air into his lungs. But the damage was too extensive. He was bleeding to death. I’d get nothing from him. No point in further questioning.
But you don’t respect the dying moments of someone who’s just tried to kill you – and may have killed your best friend in the world. There was no time left for anything elaborate. I thought briefly, then stabbed him short in both eyes. I stood up and watched the bloody tears flow black in the moonlight. I looked on gratified at the bubbling, agonised convulsions in which he finally died.
‘ Ite feri, ut se sentiat emori,’ I muttered, quoting one of the madder emperors. ‘Strike, but let him know that he’s dying.’
A shame I hadn’t been able to question him. But I’d got the shitbag too deep into the throat. Annoying for me, if a blessing for him.
My fit of the shakes had passed. Indeed, I felt rather good. I was alive and uninjured. At least three other men who’d intended to change that state of affairs were dead. Perhaps there was a justice in the world, I thought, as I cast round for my lost sword.
I found it. I sheathed it. I stepped into the full moonlight. I looked round to get my bearings, then set off in what I supposed to be the right direction home.
All the while, I was followed down the silent streets. I knew that I was followed behind. Those footsteps were now so familiar, I’d have noticed if they weren’t there. But I could have sworn there was someone in front of me. It was just one person, I thought. I never saw anyone, but I knew someone was there. He’d stop some way past each junction, to see which way I’d go. If I turned left or right, this watcher would go silent awhile, and then be heard quietly walking in front of me again.
I kept a hand on my sword. But whoever was following me had no present wish to come any closer. Slowly, and with much turning back on myself, I found my way back to Marcella’s house on the Caelian.
29
‘Well, you certainly had a busy night.’ The Ethiopian diplomat smiled broadly and unstoppered another jar of the fizzy water he’d urged on me in place of the normal wine.
He was right – and I’d only given him the incomplete version. I’d go back to find the house dark and locked up. The old watchman had still been about, however, and he’d let me in. His eyes had opened wide at the bloody mess all over me.
‘Sir, you ought to know better by now than to be out alone at night,’ he’d said, clutching at the door handle for support and breathing wine fumes at me.
I’d agreed. Certainly, Rome was turning out to be heavier on the wardrobe than I’d expected – another suit that would never look the same, even after cleaning. I’d pressed a silver coin into his hand. ‘I don’t think we need to upset your lady,’ I’d explained. ‘These past few days have been hard for her as it is. Just send me up some water, if you can.’
He could and did. And Gretel had brought it. I don’t know about you, but killing often makes me lustful, and I was wildly inflamed. I’d ripped off my clothes, washed a bit, and then dragged her into bed. I’d worn the little slut out long before rolling off her, and – according to her later description – snored like a pig till well after dawn.
Now I was having breakfast, as agreed, with the diplomat. I say ‘as agreed’. In truth, I’d clean forgotten. He’d invited me after Maximin’s death, and I’d have agreed to anything at the time without knowing what I was doing. As if that weren’t enough, there were the events of the previous night. But he’d got me out of bed with impeccable manners.
‘It’s my lady!’ Gretel had whispered at the first gentle knock. ‘She’ll have me flogged for this. She’ll sell me to the Lombards – er, back to the Lombards…’
‘I don’t think so,’ I’d grunted as I staggered from the bed. ‘I’m virtually the son of the Most Holy Saint Maximin. Besides, my rent is up to date – which probably counts for everything with the old witch.’
At last, Gretel had opened the door, and the diplomat had not once commented on the fact that she was stark naked, and smeared with some of the blood I hadn’t bothered to wash off myself, and in a hurry to get down to the kitchen before her lateness was observed. His only concern, once I’d taken an age with bathing and dressing, was to have me swear on a nice volume of what I took to be the Gospels in his own language, and a foot-high stack of relics, to absolute silence about whatever I might learn from him.
Of course, I’d sworn. Why not? It was coming back to me that he’d promised to tell me things concerning the death of Maximin. If this was useful to me, I didn’t think an oath would stand reasonably in the way of using it. Otherwise, I’d keep quiet in any event.
But he had nothing to say about Maximin beyond repeating his now formulaic regrets.
The reason why we mostly met on the toilet, I found, was that he took his meals alone in his rooms. These were larger and far more lavish than my own. The dining room was hung with blue and yellow silk. Attached to this were dozens of little icons in gold and silver frames. We sat on new ebony chairs, eating a kind of honeyed porridge, while slaves who knew only his language danced attendance on us.
‘Tell me, Aelric,’ he asked – I almost jumped at the use of my proper name: I hadn’t heard it since the murder – ‘tell me, what do you know about myrrh?’
‘Not much,’ said I. ‘Isn’t it some kind of spice? Together with gold and frankincense, it was brought by the Three Wise Men to the birth of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ.’
Bearing in mind the decor around me, I looked down and crossed myself. The diplomat did likewise, and the conversation ground to a momentary halt.
He looked up and continued: ‘Myrrh is the basic ingredient of incense, large amounts of which are used by every church. It is a dried, brownish gum that is produced chiefly in Arabia, but also across the Red Sea in my own country. It sells in Constantinople for about its weight in silver. It is cheaper here in Rome, but still expensive.’
‘I suppose,’ said I, ‘the Church will be burning a lot of it next month at the consecration.’
The diplomat smiled. ‘The Church will burn an enormous quantity of incense at the consecration. This will be the biggest event since the funeral of Pope Gregory – that is, the Most Holy Saint Gregory.’
More crossing.
‘And all this incense will be made up here in Rome. It would normally be imported ready-made from Alexandria. But the East is in such chaos, with these Persian and barbarian and civil wars, that it has been decided to import the ingredients directly.
‘The Church has awarded the contract for supplying myrrh to a company with offices in Rome and Syracuse. This is owned by a group of Sicilians and normally handles some of the shipments of grain for the papal bread distribution.
‘In negotiating this contract, the dispensator was unusually hard. The company must undertake all the risks of buying and shipping the myrrh. Once in Rome, there is no guarantee that any will be bought by the Church. Only so much as is needed, and when it is needed, will be bought. The company must absorb the cost of any delay and dispose of any surplus entirely by itself. The benefit is that the Church has agreed to pay the same rate here in Rome as in Constantinople and Ravenna for whatever quantity it does decide to buy.
